But the only experience of a ‘book’ that these people have is its shadow.Īfter suggesting that these prisoners are much like us – like all human beings – the narrative continues. They imagine the prisoners playing games that include naming and identifying the shadows as objects – such as a book, for instance – when its corresponding shadow flickers against the cave wall. Socrates and Glaucon agree that the prisoners would believe the shadows are making the sounds they hear.

What might the prisoners make of these shadows, of the noises, when they can never turn their heads to see the objects or what is behind them? Those carrying the objects may be talking, or making noises, or they may be silent. Rather like a shadow puppet play, objects are carried before the fire, from behind the low wall, casting shadows on the wall of the cave for the prisoners to see. There is a fire behind them, and between these prisoners and the fire, there is a low wall. The people have been in this dwelling since childhood, shackled by the legs and neck, such that they cannot move nor turn their heads to look around. Imagine a number of people living in an underground cave, which has an entrance that opens towards the daylight. Plato’s Republic is the best known of these and, in book VII, Socrates presents Glaucon (Plato’s older brother) with an unusual image: In these Socratic Dialogues, Socrates argues with his interlocutors in an effort to seek truth, meaning, and knowledge. We have a record of Socrates’ (469-399 BCE) oral teachings through the writings of his student, Plato (427-347 BCE). Western philosophy may be traced back to Ancient Greece. This story offers the reader an insight into one of Plato’s central concepts, namely, that eternal and unchanging ideas exist in an intellectual realm which we can only access through pure Reason.

Plato’s allegory of the cave is a classical philosophical thought experiment designed to probe our intuitions about epistemology– the study of knowledge.

Platos allegory of the cave